424
union, an article rarely to be found in commercial
contracts, namely, "That all profits made in the
concern beyond five per cent, per annum on the
capital invested, shall be laid aside for the religious,
educational, and moral improvement of the workers,
and of the community at large." And, as appears
from the Memoir of William Allen, provision was
made "for the religious education of all the children
of the labourers employed in the works, and that
nothing should be introduced tending to disparage
the Christian religion, or undervalue the authority
of the Holy Scriptures; that no books should be in-
troduced into the library until they had first been
approved of at a general meeting of the partners;
that schools should be established on the best models
of the British, or other approved systems, to which
the partners might agree; but no religious instruc-
tion, or lessons on religion, should be used, except
the Scriptures, according to the authorized version,
or extracts therefrom, without note or comment; and
that the children should not be employed in the
mills belonging to the partnership until they were of
such an age as not to be prejudicial to their health."
The pious and benevolent founder of the establish-
ment had, in like manner, provided schools and
schoolmasters for the education of the workers and
their children, and had maintained these throughout
the successive changes in the copartnery.
Mr. Owen, being thus vested with great powers
and ample means for the most enlarged benevolence,
started, under the auspices of the newly-formed com-
pany, on an extensive educational plan, embracing,
in addition to the ordinary school instruction, the
higher branches of science. He gave lessons in
military tactics, and caused the workmen to march
in order to and from school and workshop in rank
and file to the sound of drum and fife—a sort of
training rather alien to the anti-warlike predilections
of his Quaker copartners. He attempted also to
introduce Socialist principles, and became himself a
prominent leader of that party, which had hitherto
been scarcely heard of in the country. He contri-
buted largely in money for the purchase of an estate
in the neighbouring parish of Motherwell, and to
erect on it a huge building distinguished by the
name of New Harmony. In this institution, which
soon went to pieces, society was to be reconstituted
on Socialist principles, with a community of goods.
The partners of Owen were grieved at his folly, and
the public shared in their disappointment and regret.
He nevertheless pursued his own course, and the
consequence was the retirement from the company
of those members who had joined it from philan-
thropic motives, and the abandonment of their
admirably-conceived plan of raising up an intelligent,
right-principled, and well-conditioned factory popu-
lution at New Lanark. Mr. Owen continued in
connection with the mills till 1827; but during the
greater part of his latter years he was occupied in
propagating his visionary schemes of infidelity in
England and America, in which he spent a princely
fortune derived from the profits of the business.
Mr. Owen of late years resided chiefly in London,
and his children in the United States of America.
Mrs. Owen did not adopt the infidel principles of
her husband; on the contrary, soon after she had
ascertained the nature of his sentiment, she openly
avowed her faith in the Lord Jesus, connected her-
self with the church of which her father had been an
elder, and adorned her Christian profession till her
death in 1832.
As a retreat from the bustle of a city life, about
the year 1800, when his advancing years required
repose, Mr. Dale purchased Rosebank—a small
landed property and dwelling-house on the banks
of Clyde, about four miles east of Glasgow. He
was in his sixty-first year when his connection with
the Lanark mills ceased. Having acquired a hand-
some competency, he resolved on winding up his
other business affairs; but the nature of his contracts
and copartneries rendered it impossible to free his
estate from responsibility till some years after his
death. But whilst gradually withdrawing from
other business engagements, he most unaccountably,
through the influence of Mr. Owen, became a part-
ner in the Stanley Cotton Mill Company—a connec-
tion which caused him much uneasiness during the
latter years of his life, and is said to have involved
him in a loss of £60,000.
Having seceded from the Established church, and
joined the Independent communion, Mr. Dale, in
1769, undertook among them the office of minister,
in which he continued until his death, thirty-seven
years afterwards. When we turn from the survey of
Mr. Dale's multifarious duties as the pastor of a
pretty numerous church, to his active charities as a
philanthropist, we are left to wonder how he could
find time and strength to go through with the many
duties he took in hand. We find him at an early
period regularly visiting Bridewell, for the purpose
of preaching the gospel to the convicts; and his
example in this respect was long followed by his
colleagues in the church. He every year made ex-
cursions to distant parts of the country, visiting and
comforting the churches with which he stood con-
nected.
Although Mr. Dale shunned the ostentatious dis-
play of benevolence, yet his liberality could not
always be hid. The present generation have at
times had to pay very high prices for the necessaries
of life, yet no dread of famine, or even partial
scarcity, at least in Scotland, has been entertained
for at least half a century. Not so, however, during
Mr. Dale's time; for at that period the poor had
occasionally to pay ransom prices for food, and even
at these prices it sometimes could not be obtained.
In the dearth of 1782, 1791-93, and in 1799, Mr.
Dale imported, at his own risk, large quantities of
food from Ireland, America, and the continent of
Europe. To effect this, he chartered ships for the
special purpose. The food thus brought in he
retailed to the poor at prime cost, thereby in great
measure averting the threatened famine, and prevent-
ing a still greater advance in prices.
In addition to the benefits, spiritual and temporal,
conferred on his countrymen at home, he engaged
with the same ardour in most of the schemes then in
operation for extending a knowledge of the gospel of
peace in foreign countries, especially those which had
for their object the translation and circulation of the
Word of God. The proposal to translate the Scrip-
tures into the various languages of our eastern empire,
as projected and accomplished by the Baptist Mis-
sionary Society, had his hearty support from the out-
set. Mr. Andrew Fuller, of Kettering, who travelled
for the purpose of collecting funds for this object,
was kindly received by Mr. Dale, and from him re-
ceived large contributions for the cause. In Mr.
Fuller's sermon on covetousness, preached some time
after Mr. Dale's death, and printed in the fourth
volume of his works, when enjoining on his hearers
who have, to give of their abundance, and to do so
liberally, he says, "The poor people of Glasgow
used to say of a late great and good man of that city
—'David Dale gives his money by sho'elsful, but
God Almighty sho'els it back again.'"
After the sale of the Lanark mills, till his death six
years thereafter, Mr. Dale in great measure retired